The No. 4 seeded Notre Dame women’s soccer team welcomed the Milwaukee Panthers to Alumni Stadium on Friday evening for a first-round contest to open the 2024 NCAA Tournament.
This marked the fifth straight NCAA Tournament appearance, excluding the 2020 COVID season, for Notre Dame under head coach Nate Norman. The Irish have never lost a first-round match under Norman’s leadership, advancing as far as the Elite Eight in 2022. Additionally, Notre Dame has qualified for 30 of the past 32 NCAA Tournaments, dating back to the 1993 season. The Irish own a 51-4-1 record all-time in NCAA Tournament matches played in South Bend.
Across the sideline, the 2024 Horizon League Championship win over Northern Kentucky represented the seventh consecutive postseason berth for the Panthers. Milwaukee has qualified for 18 NCAA Tournaments all-time, with its first appearance coming at the end of the 1997 campaign. The Black and Gold have won three NCAA Tournament matches, while also advancing past the first round two additional times via penalty kicks. A 2021 1-0 road victory over No. 14 Xavier was Milwaukee’s most recent postseason victory.
Background and history
The Panthers had been in imperious form recently, as they held the nation’s second-longest winning streak with eight consecutive victories, while also remaining unbeaten in their last 13 matches following a 4-2 home defeat to Harvard all the way back on Sept. 13.
Star power was all over the pitch at Alumni Stadium, as head coach Kevin Boyd’s Milwaukee squad was led by the Horizon League Player of the Year in Kayla Rollins. The senior midfielder from Ann Arbor, Michigan, ranked second nationally with 18 goals on the campaign. She scored five goals in two matches of the Horizon League Tournament, en route to collecting Tournament MVP honors.
The Irish have been led all season long by an impressive collection of freshmen, most notably Izzy Engle from Edina, Minnesota. The ACC Freshman of the Year led the conference in goals with 16, which placed seventh nationally. The forward wasn’t the only Irish rookie to earn ACC honors, as both Annabelle Chukwu and Lily Joseph were selected to the All-ACC Third Team.
Friday night was the 10th meeting between the two Midwestern women’s soccer powerhouses, with the Irish leading the series 7-1-1. The previous meeting occurred in the 2023 season opener, when a Panther goal with just 32 seconds remaining earned Milwaukee the 2-2 draw and their fourth ranked result in program history.
Irish take early advantage through unexpected goal-scorer
Joseph, starting up top for the Irish, had the first chance of the night only a minute after first touch, as a volley left the Connecticut native unmarked from six yards out, but Milwaukee senior goalkeeper Parker Donahugh went down for a nice kick save to deny the Irish the early advantage.
It was a wide-open, back-and-forth first half for the opening 30 minutes, as the two sides combined for 16 shots, with the Irish holding the advantage 12-4 after the foremost half hour. The Panthers backline held strong, with Donahugh collecting five early saves while also surviving a right-footed strike from freshman midfielder Grace Restovich that clanged off the crossbar.
The next Irish chance came with roughly 10 minutes remaining in the frame, as Joseph did well to sneak a throughball to the spot for Ellie Hodsden, but Donahugh aggressively dove forward to deflect the freshman forward’s attempt.
Notre Dame was finally able to break the ice in the 38th minute as Hodsden was turned away again by the Milwaukee netminder, but graduate transfer Reagan Pauwels was left unmarked on the back post, easily cleaning up Donahugh’s eight save of the evening into the top netting. The goal was Pauwel’s first with the Irish after transferring over from Cornell, where she captured Second-Team All-Ivy League honors in 2022.
Speaking postgame about the goal, Pauwels said, “We practice these situations day in and day out. It was my first touch of the game and I wasn’t really thinking about scoring. I was just where I was supposed to be and I feel like you score most of your goals when you aren’t really thinking.” Continuing on, she said, “Everyone was screaming at me and hugging me, it was a surreal moment. I’ll never forget it.” Pauwels concluded by saying, “Moments like these are what you dream about when you transfer to Notre Dame.”
Milwaukee answers, but Irish pull away
The Irish would take that 1-0 edge into the intermission, while also holding a 17-4 shot advantage, with nine on goal. Joseph led the way for Notre Dame with six shots total and four on net in the first half.
The Irish doubled their advantage quickly coming out of the locker room, as Restovich scored her fourth career goal in the 54th minute, coming off a nice feed from sophomore Morgan Roy. It was the sixth assist of the season for the midfielder from Commerce, Michigan.
Milwaukee answered back in the 59th minute, as the third of three consecutive corner kicks from Senya Meurer bounced around at the doorstep of the goal before Jenni Andjelic’s left-footed strike flew by Notre Dame freshman goalkeeper Sonoma Kasica, pulling the Panthers back within one. It was Meurer’s sixth assist of the year, and Andjelic’s third goal.
Shortly thereafter, Engle finally left her imprint on the match, as a cheeky backheel finish stunned the Panther backline, returning the Irish advantage to two. Engle’s 17th goal was aided by the assist of graduate senior Ellie Ospeck, her seventh assist.
The Irish would continue to press, adding a fourth just a few minutes later. This time it was senior defender KJ Ronan scoring her second career goal, and her first since Sept. 26, 2021, as a freshman against Boston College. After being credited with an assist on the opening Irish goal, Hodsden collected her second of the evening on the converted corner kick.
After a line change for the Irish, sophomore forward Paige Buchner headed home her first career goal in the 88th minute off double assists from freshman midfielder Riley DeMartino and junior midfielder Berkley Mensik. Despite the 5-1 scoreline, Donahugh stood on her head with 13 saves, good for sixth-most in Milwaukee program history.
Head coach Nate Norman complimented Milwaukee, and also expressed pleasure with his team’s execution, proclaiming postgame, “I knew it was going to be a difficult game. They’re a great program, all they do is win. It can be hard to beat teams that have that belief. I thought we settled from range in the first half, but we were much better in the final third to create dangerous chances in the second half. I’m happy for our players because they worked hard to deserve this.”
Commenting on the freshmen class, Pauwels stated, “We have a special group of freshmen. They are some of the most talented players I’ve ever played with. They bring a young energy, and our job as upperclassmen is just to teach them their way, but I think they have enough experience to fit right in. They don’t act like freshmen, they already are leaders.”
Moving on
Notre Dame will now travel to Starkville, Mississippi, for the second and potentially third rounds of the NCAA Tournament. The Mississippi State Bulldogs earned hosting rights after being given the No. 1 seed in the bottom-right quadrant and downing Southern in the first round. The Irish will take on the Kentucky Wildcats in the Round of 32, after the SEC program earned the No. 5 seed in its return to the postseason following a decade-long absence. The Wildcats were able to sneak by West Virginia in penalty kicks in their first round match.
Previewing the next steps for his team, Norman stated, “We’re just keeping focus and figuring out what we need to do to combat our opponent. We’ll recover over the weekend, get prepared, and then head down there to give it our best effort.”
Notre Dame and Kentucky will battle on Friday, Nov. 22, with a first-touch time yet to be determined.
